AMD launches new generation of Ryzen 8040 processors with Ryzen AI

The race to create so-called AI PCs enters a new phase today with the launch of AMD Ryzen 8040 processors. And AMD isn’t merely claiming to be out in front for AI, but also for raw performance compared to Intel’s current generation — including the bold claim that it is up to 1.8x faster than Intel’s equivalent chip when gaming.

“Today we’re living in the dial-up era of AI,” said David McAfee, Corporate VP and General Manager at AMD in an exclusive briefing event, “and we want to get to the point where we’re in the… multi-gigabit broadband era of AI.”

What can we expect in such an era? “[It’s] going to deliver experiences whether you’re a consumer user, whether you’re a business user or whether you’re a creator,” said McAfee, “[experiences] that make you more productive, that free up your time to do things that are higher value, that allow you to iterate more and iterate faster on the things that you want to do.”

Table of contents

• Ryzen 8040 versus Ryzen 7040
• When will the AMD Ryzen 8040 series go on sale?
• Ryzen 8040 series models and specifications
• Who should buy AMD Ryzen 8040 series laptops?
• AMD Ryzen AI software platform

Related reading: An in-depth guide to AMD Ryzen Pro

Ryzen 8040 versus Ryzen 7040

The Ryzen 8040 series chips follow on from the Ryzen 7040 series, which debuted Ryzen AI. However, despite the jump in numbers, they are still based on the same Zen 4 architecture and the same Radeon 780M graphics. So there is no jump in general performance, only in generative AI performance.

According to AMD, the 8040 series is 40% faster than the 7040 series in both Llama 2 and Vision models. This is based on AMD’s testing and compares a Ryzen 9 7940HS to a Ryzen 7 8840HS (with other specifications essentially identical).

This difference is down to what AMD calls XDNA, its neural processor (or AI engine). In the 7040 series, this produced 10 NPU TOPS and 33 total TOPS; in the 8040 series, those figures are 16 and 39 respectively. NPU stands for neural processing unit, TOPS for tera operations per second.

When will the AMD Ryzen 8040 series go on sale?

David McAfee said that samples were already being tested by AMD’s partners with laptops likely to go on sale in the first quarter of 2024.

When pushed on exactly when we can expect laptops to go on sale — February, March? — McAfee wouldn’t go any further. “Like I said, we are shipping to many customers today. That enablement is going very well with those customers. I expect a very rapid ramp in 2024 of 8040 series platforms.”

Acer, Asus, HP and Lenovo have already shipped laptops with Ryzen 7040 chips inside, but McAfee made a point of mentioning that Dell would also be shipping Ryzen 8040 laptops in 2024.

Ryzen 8040 series models and specifications

It’s worth noting that the bottom two chips, the Ryzen 5 8540U and Ryzen 3 8440U, don’t include the XDNA neural processors so do not offer Ryzen AI.

Who should buy AMD Ryzen 8040 series laptops?

For now, the most obvious market is developers. If you’re creating AI-enabled apps (especially those based on open-source LLMs such as Meta’s Lllama 2) then you should see dramatic speed improvements.

In the long term, AMD hopes the answer will be “everyone”. However, that relies on apps becoming widely available that take advantage of NPUs. We have already seen Apple and its partners embrace NPUs, which have been built into its own silicon since day one, but that’s a huge and closed market.

Things are very different on Windows, where laptops with NPUs are likely to be the minority for years to come. Although AMD is working with all the expected names — Adobe, daVinci, Microsoft, Avid — we are yet to see anything close to the so-called killer app. It’s slightly demoralising that AMD was pushing the Windows Experience Pack, with blurred effects in video calls, as its most obvious benefit when it launched the 7040 series.

This isn’t to say that people won’t see a difference. AMD listed over 25 Adobe Photoshops tools that use Ryzen AI, including Content Aware Fill and 11 Neural Filters. And Blackmagic DaVinci Resolve includes around 20 AI-enabled skills, such as voice isolation.

AMD Ryzen AI software platform

David McAfee also introduced tools for developers at the pre-briefing event: the AMD Ryzen AI software platform.

“This is a class of tools for developers that we’re going to continue to enhance and develop and build upon over the next several months and quarters to make it a really rich toolset for end users, developers, students and enthusiasts who want to explore AI, and who want to turn on AI experiences on their platforms,” he said.

This brings us back to who should buy laptops with Ryzen AI built in. AMD’s hope is that it is democratising AI development so that anyone can do it. Well, so long as they buy one of their laptops.

Related reading:

• Move over Nvidia: AMD unveils Instinct MI300 AI accelerators and Dell is ready to take orders right now
• AMD Ryzen AI could push people from the cloud to local machines
• AMD releases Ryzen Threadripper 7000 CPUs in response to public demand